Abstract : « The study investigated preferences of consumers of food retailing outlets in Germany for sustainability labeled cut roses. A sample of 1,201 respondents of an online survey was used to analyze their preferences based on a conjoint experiment in which a bunch of ten roses was considered which differed concerning the labeling certificate, country of production of the plants, price, packaging, smell and blossom size of the roses. Latent class analysis revealed existence of consumer heterogeneity with around two thirds of the respondents being strongly in favor of sustainability labels. Thereby Fairtrade labeled roses got an overall positive assessment whereby organic roses were only preferred by 31% of the respondents. In addition, paper or no packaging, strong smell and uniform big blossom sizes got overall positive consumer evaluations in the experiment. The study concludes that sustainability labeled plants might be an option for producers to append additional value to horticultural products in Germany. »

« The study reported in this paper investigated the determinants of fair trade (FT) product purchase intention among Dutch consumers according to the extended Theory of Planned Behaviour and determined whether the effects of those determinants differ between male and female consumers. To test the various research hypotheses, an online survey with 499 respondents from a Dutch research panel was employed. Results of the multi-group analysis using a structural equation modelling approach reveal that FT product purchase intention of both male and female consumers are predicated on moral obligation and self-identity. The impact of subjective norm on purchase intention is statistically significant for male consumers only. Analyses reveal that, indeed, the impact of subjective norm on FT product purchase intention is moderated by consumers’ gender. »

Abstract : « Demand for and supply of “sustainable” coffee (and other commodities) have grown markedly for two decades, as has the literature analyzing the effects of voluntary sustainability standards for coffee. The evidence for assessing the impacts for smallholder producers and the environment remains relatively weak, however. A relatively small number of studies use methods that allow researchers to attribute observed outcomes to sustainability certifications. This paper reviews research from the past decade on the effects of coffee sustainability schemes to see what we have learned about the impact of such schemes, and whether positive livelihood effects are mainly the result of relatively better off households choosing to participate. Overall, the available research suggests that certification schemes can be beneficial, but context matters, and the poorest, most vulnerable smallholder producers are able to comply with sustainability standards only with substantial external help. »

Abstract : « This article traces the history of painted and printed textile tradition of the ‘Kalamkari’ technique of India, using mordants and natural dyes. The backdrop of the tradition and its development through the centuries up to the current times has been elucidated. Kalamkari started in the 17th century ; originated as a religious tapestry and later became a secular craft under Muslim rule. The kingdom of Golconda in the South of India was a trading centre for diamonds, gems and textiles. The word Kalamkari or working with the pen evolved when the Golconda Sultans called the craftsmen as ‘kalamkars‘. ‘Kalamkari‘thus literally means, art work done using a pen. The story is conveyed by examining the centres where this was/is practised, showcasing older classic and later contemporary images, the artists, the techniques used and exploring the 21st century scenario of this textile art. »

Abstract : "Two-sided marketplaces are platforms that have customers not only on the demand side (e.g. users), but also on the supply side (e.g. retailer, artists). While traditional recommender systems focused specifically towards increasing consumer satisfaction by providing relevant content to consumers, two-sided marketplaces face the problem of additionally optimizing for supplier preferences, and visibility. Indeed, the suppliers would want a fair opportunity to be presented to users. Blindly optimizing for consumer relevance may have a detrimental impact on supplier fairness. Motivated by this problem, we focus on the trade-off between objectives of consumers and suppliers in the case of music streaming services, and consider the trade-off between relevance of recommendations to the consumer (i.e. user) and fairness of representation of suppliers (i.e. artists) and measure their impact on consumer satisfaction. We propose a conceptual and computational framework using counterfactual estimation techniques to understand, and evaluate different recommendation policies, specifically around the trade-off between relevance and fairness, without the need for running many costly A/B tests. We propose a number of recommendation policies which jointly optimize relevance and fairness, thereby achieving substantial improvement in supplier fairness without noticeable decline in user satisfaction. Additionally, we consider user disposition towards fair content, and propose a personalized recommendation policy which takes into account consumer’s tolerance towards fair content. Our findings could guide the design of algorithms powering two-sided marketplaces, as well as guide future research on sophisticated algorithms for joint optimization of user relevance, satisfaction and fairness. »